Let me explain.

Now, the drive from Silver City, NM to Tucson, AZ is only a 3.5-4 hour drive, which is one of our shorter drives on the Plan G US Road Trip.

Path from Silver City, NM to Tucson, AZ

But that’s still long enough to require a pit stop somewhere along the way.  Thus far on the trip most of our pit stops have wound up being at fast-food chain restaurants, either at a Subway outlet when we want to also have something to eat or McDonald’s when we’re just in search of (usually) reliably clean facilities.

But as we approached the point where we wanted to stop that day in Arizona, we started to see giant billboards for apple pie. Specifically, world famous homemade pie at a place called Apple Annie’s in Willcox, Arizona. The billboards also promised clean restrooms.

So, of course, we felt we had to stop there. And while we were there, we had to try the pie … just for the blog fodder potential, you understand.

Apple Pie and Cinnamon Ice-cream, Apple Annie’s, AZ

That is a huge piece of pie, plus a ton of ice cream on top. It was good, but a little too much for a quick mid-trip snack.

But, FWIW, should you find yourself in Wilcox, Arizona one of these days, I can recommend the apple pie, the cinnamon ice-cream, and also the cleanliness of the rest-rooms at Apple Annie’s.

In addition to having a great time catching up with an old friend, we also had a chance to visit some museums in Tucson, all of which were interesting for a variety of reasons. Two highlights

• Arizona State Museum – Well-done exhibits on the history of native americans as well as a nifty “pottery vault” that is (they say) the world’s largest collection of Native American pottery.  Plus, I had a chance to talk with the photo curator there, a very friendly and helpful woman who was a pleasure to talk with, even if her collection of photos doesn’t tie neatly into my project.  But an enjoyable meeting none-the-less!
• Center for Creative Photography. One highlight to our visit to their public (and free!) gallery was seeing the original negative of a photo by Ansel Adams called Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico, along with notes he made on how to produce one of the hundreds of printed versions of that photo. I’ve lectured about this photo a bunch, and I often use it in my workshops as an example of the notion of how “taking” a photo is different from “making” a photo, since the original negative of Adams’ photos do not translate to a final print without a lot of work in the darkroom (or, nowadays, digital darkroom).  In fact, it was reading about how Ansel Adams made this particular photo years ago that changed the way I approached my photography. So, it was fun to see the negative in person and see from his notes the dozen or more controlled changes he made to make one of his prints from that negative.

Anyway, those were just a few of the highlights from Tucson. Here in Tempe, we  have some more museums to target as well as a few relatives to visit with. One of the constants in Arizona no matter where you are, though, are the cacti. There are tons of cacti everywhere, including the ubiquitous giant Saguaros, with their distinctive shape:

Saguaros at Sunset, Arizona

Although I found the light in New Mexico more “enchanting” so far than the light in Tucson of Tempe, the combination of a few streaks of light at sunset behind a stunningly shaped cactus does inspire taking — and making — a photo in Arizona.

The scenery on the drive from Silver City to Tucson was really stunning: you come over the mountains in New Mexico and suddenly see a vista of the desert stretched before you, with a series of mountains/hills in the distance, . Here’s an attempt to give you a quick sense of that view, taken with the cell phone while we quickly stopped by the side of the road (not much traffic on that road, at least not on a Saturday afternoon in December):

Panorama: New Mexico/Arizona border (click to open in a new window; then click on that again)

Panorama: New Mexico/Arizona border (zoomed in)

Here in Tucson, the sky at sunset as been pretty great, too. Although we haven’t been in the right place in town to get an optimal photo of that, this photo taken from the parking area where we’re staying will give you a small sense of the colors in the sky. Please note the photo hasn’t been altered at all — the colors really have been this stunning:

Tucson sunset

The weather here has also been gorgeous: high 70s°F / 21°C during the day, cooler at night. Practically perfect. But in summer the  average high is over 100°F ( 38°C) — everyday — for 3 entire months. Yikes. That’s a little too hot to make Tucson “paradise”  year-round as far as I’m concerned. Quite the reverse, IMHO.

But at least for a couple of days in December, the weather here is not bad at all.